By Lisa Schievelbein

For many communicators, Legal is a slayer of dreams.

I’ve heard this (paraphrased) complaint countless times across six years of CEC member conversations. The source of the conflict varies, but the storyline is usually the same: Legal vetoes communication ideas that depart from a “command and control” approach to corporate communication. It probably goes without saying, then, that social media has been a virtual Celebrity Deathmatch between the functions.

That said, we’re seeing some promising signs of a relationship thaw. Exhibit A: last week, CEC members joined their Legal and Marketing brethren at a panel discussion about cross-functional collaboration in social media. The 90-minute session was co-hosted by two of CEC’s sister programs (GCR and MLC) and headlined by Wal-Mart, Allstate, and Coca-Cola. Despite some differences of opinion, the overall consensus was clear: these three functions need to work together to manage the legal landmines of social media WHILE aggressively using it to the company’s advantage in engaging stakeholders. Here are 4 tips specifically for Comms in negotiating this balance with Legal: Read More »

Click image to play

In the most dissected PR tactic since Bill Clinton first addressed the Monica Lewinsky affair, Tiger Woods delivered a statement in front of a hand-picked crowd unable to ask any questions.  I’ve argued in the past that the real lesson was from his allowing such a disconnect between the perception and reality of his life, but because Tiger is as close to a functioning business as an athlete could possibly be, I believe it’s instructive for professional communicators to assess his performance nonetheless.

My answer: Disastrous (but it’s not all his fault!). Read More »

I do not feel old.

I can’t predict the weather based on whether my joints hurt.  I can eat a hunk of jalapeno cornbread on my way upstairs to bed, and still fall fast asleep.  I’ve never been to The Scooter Store (although I have been to a taping of The Price Is Right—twice, actually).

But when I think about how different the communications landscape is today—compared to when I started my career—it’s scary to think of how old I really am. Read More »

By Rebecca Canan

Last week, I learned a firsthand (and inadvertent) lesson about the new rules of media relations.  Here’s the story timeline:

• Washington DC has a series of blizzards across the week, leaving behind more than 50 inches of snow.
• Mid-blizzard, CEB (parent company of CEC) sends out an email stating that the office would be open regular hours, but to let your manager know if you were unable to come in.
• I laugh in disbelief.
• In aforementioned state of disbelief, I sign on to my personal Twitter account and tweet about it.
• Thursday morning I wake up to find that my seemingly personal and innocuous tweet has been cited in the Washington Post (PRINT AND ONLINE VERSIONS) with the context below—my own emphasis added:

Some Washington businesses that urged employees’ attendance have been getting pounded on washingtonpost.com and Twitter. Employees of Rosslyn-based Corporate Executive Board expressed exasperation that their office was initially open: “bec54″ wrote, “Boycotting CEB’s decision to stay open today by sitting on the couch in my fleece onesie. This snow is INSANE.”

[INSERT PANIC]  Pounded!?!  My fleece ONESIE?!?!  NOOOOooooo! Read More »

By Mike Wellman

It’s not often that you hear the words “banjo” and “communications” in the same sentence.  I think most CEOs would be hesitant to put the boy banjo player from Deliverance up on a podium, much less put him in charge of their reputations!  As silly as the concept sounds, in many ways we have become a fish out of water in our own field, and it turns out that a banjo-player is the exemplar for learning how to adapt.

In the recent documentary, Throw Down Your Heart, a favorite musician of mine, banjo player Béla Fleck, journeys to several countries in Africa to play the banjo with local musicians—rare collaborations that produce a whole new type of music.  In taking this journey, Béla hoped to challenge his own abilities and grow as a musician as well as dissociate the banjo from stigma and reveal its ancestry as a descendant of African instruments.  His journey as a “stranger in a strange land” parallels recent sentiments I’ve heard from communicators’ less voluntary journeys, and I think we can only hope to emulate his success in adapting to a changing environment. Read More »

Once upon a time, the intranet’s purpose was to store information for a small set of users, usually just IT geeks. Back in those days, decentralized intranet governance was fine, given the simplicity of the systems.

Today, however, intranets have evolved into must-have business tools for all employees. We all know that this shift in scale, interconnectivity, and user base has significant implications for intranet governance. In short, loose models simply don’t work.

If these decentralized governance models no longer work, then what does? The best models I’ve come across promote co-ownership between Communications and IT. In these partnerships, Communications almost always owns the strategy and IT designs and supports the tools to execute this strategy. Read More »

For $3 million dollars per 30-second spot, Super Bowl advertisers gave us Betty White, talking babies (again), Danica Patrick (again), a Google wedding, and more late-night wars (why would Leno appear in a competitor’s commercial?), among other sophomoric hijinks. Those were my favorites in an otherwise uninspiring line-up. But even when our marketing brethren aren’t so funny, I see several ways that communicators can help their organizations get more out of any significant investment in advertising: Read More »

As a freshman at the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University (in the era just after the introduction of indoor plumbing, but slightly before Twitter), we Comms majors were forced to take the ultra-boring pre-requisite lecture course known as “Intro to Mass Media.” I remember sitting in the back row snarking to my fellow inmates, “Why do they force us to sit through this drone-a-thon? It has no relevance whatsoever!”

Turns out I was right. Not at the time (I rarely was…then) but in 2010, it’s increasingly true that the news media aren’t so “mass” anymore.

The Washington Post reported late last year that U.S. newspaper circulation has hit its lowest level in seven decades, as papers across the country lost 10.6 percent of their paying readers, compared with a year earlier. (For the Post, reporting this story is roughly the equivalent of Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn attending their own funeral.)
Read More »

By Evelyn Ostrovsky 

If two weeks ago you didn’t know about the American Red Cross’s social media use, you do now. The Red Cross’s innovative fundraising efforts for Haiti relief show that a little social media can go a long way in rallying global support for a common cause.

Given this success, it’s ironic that the Red Cross’s social media manager, Wendy Harman, was initially hired 4 years ago to “make the internet stop.” Red Cross executives were concerned about the volume of negative comments about the organization after Hurricane Katrina, and they wanted to somehow make the criticism go away. (Now, all good communicators out there realize that this is impossible, but can certainly relate to the sentiment.) Instead of staying in combat mode, however, Wendy saw an opportunity to enable advocates to rally around the Red Cross cause. Her journey from “make it stop” to empowering supporters took a few rogue experiments, some excellent listening skills, and the know-how to rein in overzealous business partners.

We’re thrilled to have Wendy share her story at a CEC webinar next Tuesday (February 9 at 11 EST). CEC members can register now for this event; if you’re reading this after the fact, you can check out the event replay here.

Now, let’s hear from you. What did you notice about social media’s role in fundraising for Haiti? What takeaways do you find transferable to the corporate setting?

It may say something about me (the voyeur/research geek) that I’ve been eagerly awaiting the 2010 Edelman Trust Barometer results to see how the recession has impacted trust in business. I have to admit, I was surprised at how quickly trust seems to be bouncing back from the gutter that was 2009 (caveat: 70% of respondents think companies will go back to “business as usual” once conditions improve). For Comms, the most important finding may be the last one, focused on how companies can really earn that trust.  Long story short: engage with everyone, all the time.

This conclusion would probably bring even the most superhuman communicators to their knees. Something has got to give. In my humble opinion, Comms needs to stop trying to push more messages into more channels in an outdated hub-and-spoke model.  Instead, Comms needs to motivate stakeholders to share information about the company with their peers. This not only makes universal, 24/7 engagement more physically possible; it also happens to be a more effective way to generate trust and support for your organization. Read More »